The Compliance of Argos Rho-4
The Compliance of Argos-Rho IV was a battle fought by the Lightning Bearers against the Eldar for control of the Argos-Rho system and the Webway gates located there. The Battle of the Gates For much of the Great Crusade, the Ist Legion enjoyed unrivaled popularity and support among the Legions. Although they were welcome sight to see on any battlefield, it did not prevent the Legion from having its own idiosyncrasies that puzzled other parties that could also uncomfortably bear some resemblance to mysticism. One such strange strand among the Lightning Bearers were the Volta of the Blue Shield. Any Space Marine who has the distinction of wearing terminator plate is profoundly intimidating to the average human as the already giant body of a legionnaire gains twice its weight and size in a tank the shape of a man. The Volta go one step further in having no lenses on their helmets. For every member of the Volta is blind. This is not some gene-seed anomaly but a direct result of their training. The Volta undergo intense psychic training in the arts of foresight that eventually lead to a final trial where they are ritually blinded. This ritual is to further strengthen their powers at divination by sacrificing their mundane sight for the supernatural. While not a few have criticized this practice as smelling of bald superstition, none could deny the Volta's effectiveness in war. This was demonstrated comprehensively in the Compliance of Argos-Rho IV. First identified on stellar charts by the infamous Rogue Trader Intana Yonez, the Argos-Rho system was rich in resources and habitable planets. All initial scans suggested the system was quite the find, and the Administratum quickly drew up plans to have the system claimed and colonised in the name of the Emperor. Yonez, then young and new to his profession, moved to explore the system. As a consequence he was witness to the events which unfolded there, and it is his writings that inform this account. Upon arriving in the system aboard the galleas Sidewinder, the Rogue Trader and his crew were surprised and alarmed to find that a ship had arrived before them, and destroyed. Identifying it at the Warp-runner Hunting Hound, they sent out an astropathic call to any Imperial fleets and withdrew to the Oort Cloud to wait. Cautious of whatever had dispatched the first vessel, they conducted only the most discreet auspex probes, but managed to identify the signs of Eldar weapons on the wreckage. To the outriders’ surprise, an answer came to them a mere hour after their communication. The Wayfarer, a Lighting Bearers cruiser, translated in-system with its escorts. Commanding the vessel was the venerable Asizaga, the then commander of the Volta. Yonez began his report, only for the Lightning Bearer to cut him short and bid him prepare his galleas for battle. The enemy vessels were unsurprisingly a handful of Eldar warships, which engaged the Imperial vessels before being beaten back. This would merely be the opening move, Asizaga predicted that a Lightning Bearer expeditionary fleet was already in transit. Pressed by Yonez about the fate of the scouting ship, he claimed that the destruction of the Hunting Hound had been "hitsuzen". Among the Volta of the Blue Shield, the future is held to be malleable except for certain events in time. No matter what the Volta may will or do, these fixed moments will come to pass, regardless of their efforts. This concept is what the Volta call hitsuzen. Thus Asizaga, though aware of the doom befalling the Hunting Hound, believed this was one event beyond his ability to manipulate and thus irrelevant. Of greater import, he told, Yonez, was the battle to come, and as if at his cue, reality tore open and the 21st Expeditionary Fleet entered the system. Marshal Kionen took charge of what was now a full invasion, rapidly building up a strategic picture of the system. The Sidewinder ran ahead, Yonez noting strange aetheric signatures ahead as well as an Eldar war fleet readying itself for battle. When he reported his findings, the Volta confirmed his suspicion that strange xenos devices were responsible for the mysterious readings. These were identified as Webway portals - the mysterious passages which predates even that ancient species. Four were located on the fourth planet, dubbed 21-42 for the campaign, but while these were relatively small, the fifth and by far the largest hung in the void. The Akiran tech-priests identified this as one of the fabled “great arteries” which would permit a starship to enter the Labyrinth Dimension. Even as the Imperials drew close, more Eldar vessels slipped from its aperture into realspace. As such, it would need to be invested and then held with infantry alone, and would undoubtedly be most heavily contested by the Eldar. Presented with a dual threat and prize, the Lightning Bearers set to the task immediately. Kionen divided his warriors and auxiliaries into task forces for the seizure of each gate, determining that his own companies would take the great void-gate. Asizaga and his sightless warriors would go with them. The Ist Legion ships brought their engines to full burn and met the Eldar in a veritable cascade of fire. The alien vessels were swift and powerful, but locked into a battle of relatively static defence they were at a profound disadvantage against the more robust ships of the Legion and its allies. With just three hours of fighting, they were consigned to the same fate as the Hunting Hound and Kionen and Asizaga led their warriors into the structure of the great gate. Rakurai, Army soldiers and Akiran taghma would take part in the fighting on Argos-Rho IV, but the void gate would be the most heavily defended, and Kionen deemed it a fight for the Astartes alone. Fighting raged through the wraithbone halls and passageways as Eldar warriors raced to meet the attackers, coming to a head in the grand control nexus. Here Kionen and his five thousand warriors halted and dug in, and now the Eldar came against them. The Lightning Bearers fought, as Yonez described it, “like a volcanic island ringed by a savage sea”. The Volta anchored the formation, their volkite culverins setting their foes ablaze and their precognition countering the Eldar’s speed flawlessly. All the while, their sighted brethren poured gunfire into the ranks of Eldar or matched them in bladework, hissing alien chainswords against Akiran vibro-katana. A gruelling but frenetic battle of attrition resulted, as each side fought to exhaust the other. But the Eldar could never match the Astartes for endurance, especially not Terminator-clad giants like the Volta. So as the forces on the great gate and the world below cemented their control, the aliens began to fall back and finally flee into the portals, if the Imperials did not catch them first. Finally the last warrior fell and the few remaining ships retreated within. Legion warriors and gunships probed the gates, only to report that the passages beyond had been sealed by the Eldar a few kilometres into the labyrinth. The gates were rendered inert, but the system belonged to the Imperium. Imperial colonists quickly came to the system, and Kionen, as the theatre commander, appointed a new Imperial governor from the Rakurai command, with a mandate to keep watch over the gates. Before rejoining the Imperial Crusade, Asizaga left one final warning, concerning the fourth gate which lay beneath the planet of Argos-Rho IV. Here the Lightning Bearers had taken a far greater proportion of casualties than elsewhere; the details are sparse but Yonez’s few notes on the matter mention that Susanoo Empyon, then a mere captain, was credited with staving off disaster in the caverns. Asizaga left a cryptic warning that the catacombs were to be sealed, and no man enter unless he wished to “trespass upon Death’s realm.” Only during the Insurrection would the truth behind these grim words be unveiled. Category:Imperial Campaigns Category:Great Crusade